Driven by the idea of making dental services easily accessible, Dr Devaiah Mapangada built a fully-equipped clinic in a van, and started visiting college campuses with his mobile clinic.

This was a tentative first step to a dental services business, in partnership with Vivek Madappa, a serial entrepreneur, who tweaked the business model to make it scalable. The two joined hands and started health services company MobiDent in July 2014. In less than three years, the company has already treated about 51,000 patients.

Besides providing affordable dental care, the idea behind a dental clinic in a suitcase' was also aimed at empowering scores of young dentists and help them build a career.

“Some 30,000 dental students graduate every year. Unlike other professional courses, there is no company or industry waiting to hire them. And the cost of setting up a clinic is too high,“ says Madappa.

Bengaluru-based MobiDent, which started out with just three dentists, now has a staff of 52 that includes 36 dentists.

The startup was founded with an investment of Rs 10 lakh, put in by the co-founders, and it raised Rs 1.25 crore in angel funding in 2015, an undisclosed sum in July 2016 and Rs 1.6 crore in December 2016.

Funds have helped the startup build intellectual properties, scale rapidly and create entry-barriers for copy cats', say the founders. The startup had some teething troubles implementing its dentalcare-on-the-go model.

“Doctors are used to working either in a clinic or a hospital. Not as employees in a setup that is similar to that of an IT company or a BPO. This unfamiliarity led to some resistance,“ says Madappa.

Besides offering attractive remuneration to attract talent, MobiDent set up a soft-skills training programme for dentists, who gradually started coming on board. “A dentist who sets up her own clinic will take 10 years to treat 2,000 patients. A MobiDent dentist can see more than 2,000 patients in a year and a half,“ says Madappa.

MobiDent started out with a business-to-business model and partnered with corporates offering dental care services to their employees. In the last two years, the company has conducted dental care camps in more than 500 companies.

In 2015, it expanded its services, teaming-up with hospitals in Bengaluru, Mysore, Pune and Ahmedabad. “In most hospitals, only dental consultation is available in the OPD. MobiDent has set up mobile and portable dental clinics in 20 hospitals,“ says Madappa.

Home dental care has been the company's newest entry, wherein it provides dental care services directly to patients.

The startup has seen a healthy growth in its top line, from just about Rs 32 lakh in 2014-15 to Rs 1.25 crore in 2015-16. It is on track to close 2016-17 with a revenue of Rs 2.25 crore.

“Our near-term target is to roll out our services in 20 towns in 2017. In the next three years, we plan on hiring 3,000 dentists, training 1,000 dental hygienists and expanding to 200 towns,“ says Madappa.

Winner of the best startup idea award by Royal Academy of Engineering, London, in 2016, MobiDent is starting operations in Kenya where it will be working with the ministry of health, and the country's dental colleges and train 80 dentists a year to make dental care affordable and accessible in Kenya.“This is in line with our goal to serve one million customers by 2018,“ says Madappa.